F-35 brings new era to Marine aviation

Lt. Col. Jeff Scott, commanding officer of VMFA-121, Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121, at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, salutes during the re-designation ceremony for the squadron, with a backdrop of Marines and the F-35B Lightning II aircraft, the first Marine Corps squadron to receive the new jet.
— Howard Lipin

Lt. Col. Jeff Scott, commanding officer of VMFA-121, Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121, at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma, salutes during the re-designation ceremony for the squadron, with a backdrop of Marines and the F-35B Lightning II aircraft, the first Marine Corps squadron to receive the new jet.
— Howard Lipin

YUMA  The ceremony Tuesday to establish the Defense Department’s first operational squadron of F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jets was a marquee moment for the program and its most eager customer, the Marine Corps. It also was a reminder of how far the costly and long awaited aircraft must go before it is ready for battle.

A squadron from Marine Corps Air Station Miramar that relinquished its Hornet F/A-18D fighter jets three months ago was relocated and rechristened Marine Fighter Attack Squadron 121 — an F-35B unit expected to grow to 16 jets and more than 300 Marines over the next year.

Lockheed Martin was awarded the contract in 2001 to develop three versions of a “fifth generation” supersonic stealth jet sharing most of the missions systems and propulsion. The Marine Corps sought the most technically challenging version, one that can land like a helicopter, to replace three aging aircraft, the F/A-18 Hornet, the AV-8B Harrier and the EA-6B Prowler.

The Air Force, which bought a conventional landing model, and the Navy, which ordered one that can land on aircraft carriers, both plan to use the F-35 to supplement other planes in their fleets.

Gen. James Amos, commandant of the Marine Corps, said the F-35B is at the forefront of probably the most important transition in the 100-year history of Marine aviation since the introduction of the helicopter, as virtually every Marine aircraft is replaced by 2025.

“For the first time in aviation history, the most lethal fighter characteristics, supersonic speed, radar-evading stealth, extreme agility, short takeoff/vertical landing capability, and an impressive array of 21st century weapons have been combined in a single platform … the F-35B Lightning II you see behind me,” Amos said during the ceremony.

The F-35B still faces significant challenges as engineers fine-tune some 6 million lines of software code — about three times what the most sophisticated aircraft has — and the helmet-mounted display system, Amos said afterward.

But he struck a triumphant note during the ceremony. “From the early challenges of the F-35 program, and more specifically arguments against the fielding of our B model, this program has arrived here today with a growing string of notable successes and significant momentum,” he said, citing accelerating flight testing, pilot training, and now the first operational squadron.

When Lt. Col. Jeff “Magwa” Scott, commanding officer of the new squadron, and Sgt. Maj. Carlos Williams, its senior enlisted leader, uncased the colors, the “Green Knights” unfurled the next step in the evolution of Marine aviation and its integration with ground forces — the hallmark of the service that allows Marines to “fight above their weight,” said Robert Work, undersecretary of the Navy.

The F-35B will also help the Marines integrate more deeply with Navy tactical aviation, Work added, by allowing the Corps to one day fly the same fighter jet off smaller amphibious ships as it does aircraft carriers, effectively doubling the Navy’s carrier fleet.

“This is a big, big step for the Joint Strike Fighter program, which is going to maintain U.S. air dominance,” in coming years, he said, speaking to several hundred military, industry and political leaders gathered in a hangar on the Marine Corps Air Station Yuma flight line.

Fielding the first operational squadron also ends a troubled chapter in the jet’s history, Work said.

Now that excessive weight and many of the technological glitches with the Marine version are being resolved, military officials said the focus will turn increasingly to bringing down program costs and improving training and operations.

“We knew our airplanes are running out of service life. The Harriers, the Hornets, the Prowlers. We’ve been managing that now for the last several years and we will continue to manage that over the next decade,” Amos said. By replacing them all with the F-35B, “in the long run it’s actually going to save money and make sense.”

The cost of developing and purchasing the F-35 for the three services was originally estimated at $233 billion, or about $69 million per aircraft. The most recent estimate puts the price at more than $395 billion and double the original per-unit cost. Adding in the costs of sustaining the F-35 fleet over its life span puts the weapons program at about $1.2 trillion, making it the most expensive ever.

The target date to begin full production has slipped six years to 2019. The Marine version supposed to be ready to deploy this year is not expected to pass that milestone until at least 2015.

In January the F-35B was cleared from probation and imminent danger of cancellation. The following month Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., questioned whether the defense secretary had been premature to do so, and some lawmakers continue to push for sacrificing the Marine version in favor of overall program savings and help balancing the federal budget.

In December, McCain had called the Joint Strike Fighter program “both a scandal and a tragedy.” But after a year of what he described as marked improvement in the program, McCain struck a different note Tuesday.

“We should all be humbled and proud” to see the F-35 in Yuma, he said. "I am — after many years of frustration and setbacks — encouraged that the overall program is moving in the right direction.

“It is still early in flight testing,” he cautioned. “Much work remains to be sure that the aircraft is truly operational and the program can be called a success.” It looked like the Joint Strike Fighter program was an aircraft carrier running aground, but “this ship now seems to be pointing into the blue ocean,” he said.

Other guests included Arizona Gov. Janice Brewer; Lt. Gen Robert Schmidle, head of Marine aviation; Lt. Gen. John Toolan, commanding general of the West Coast Marine force headquartered at Camp Pendleton; and Robert Stevens, chief executive of Lockheed Martin.

The audience gasped when an F-35 unexpectedly flew overhead. Then the crowd stood to watch Maj. Aric “Walleye” Liberman taxi the squadron’s second F-35B into a shade hangar. Liberman, who spent three years at Eglin Air Force Base, Fla., preparing to fly the F-35 for the Marine Corps, flew the squadron’s first jet to Yuma on Friday.

Liberman had to land the F-35B in the conventional manner, since operational pilots are not yet allowed to land vertically or even fly in the Yuma area after delivery.

The decision to begin operations before the jet is ready for full production gives the Marine Corps a head start building capacity and helps the manufacturer improve the aircraft, said Col. Kevin Killea, who oversees aviation requirements for the Marine Corps.

“We can learn a lot through the discovery of the maturation of this airplane and fielding it before we deploy it. As long as we are with the test community as they open the envelope and we stay within the safe envelope of the airplane, we feel that there are huge benefits,” he said in an interview. For the pilots and mechanics, “when they do finally deploy, they’ll have hundreds of hours under their belt instead of just a couple.”

Eventually Yuma, with its superb year-round flying weather and access to the Barry M. Goldwater Range, will be home to five F-35 squadrons. The base is also home to Marine Aviation and Weapons Tactics Squadron One, which will help refine the new aircraft’s tactics and training regimen as it is further developed.

Two new steel and masonry hangars, with two more on the way, a communications center, a maintenance building for impending jet retrofits and a simulation center are among half a billion dollars in F-35 improvements at Marine Corps Air Station Yuma.

Brig. Gen. Steven Busby, commanding general of the 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing, said the introduction of the F-35B into Marine operations was a momentous day. “It’s got some ways to go, but part of making that a success is standing up this operational squadron and being able to perform operational tests.